2009 July » Birdbrain(ed) Book Blog

My Last 20 Books

Posted by Anastasia on July 31, 2009 No Responses »

Jul 312009

My Last 20 Books I have a hard time resisting memes. I’m surprised I’ve managed to stick with only two weeklies for so long! But this one, which I found via Cathy at Kittling: Books, is pretty much a one-off, so I’m not feeling any guilt about playing.

Basically, I’m supposed to take the last twenty books I’ve reviewed and talk about where I got them. Then, write something about them. I’m sure I’m not the only one interested in where I get my books, since I only mention it in passing in my actual reviews. Plus, I know you lot are snoops (and so am I).

Going in reverse chronological order:

The Demon and the City

Webscriptions.net

Eastern Standard Tribe

Craphound.com

The Demon’s Lexicon

Fly By Night

Heroes of the Valley

Eon: Dragoneye Reborn

The Anybodies

There Will Be Dragons

Baen.com

The Buried Pyramid

Tor.com

The Undomestic Goddess

Fictionwise.com

Merchant of Death

Magic Kingdom For Sale– Sold!

The Dealer

Well Witched

Fire and Hemlock

Frugal Reader

Behind the Curtain

Fictionwise.com

Curse of the Bane

The Ink Drinker

Revenge of the Witch

BookCloseouts.com

Only Human

BookMooch

So:

8/20 were bought with my own money.
5/20 were borrowed from a library (for free).
5/20 were downloaded for free from various websites.
2/20 were obtained through a book trading website.

In other words, 8/20 were paid for, 12/20 were free (though none were actually given to me).

I feel that this is pretty par for the course. Every once in a while I’ll have an ARC or two to review, but actually that hasn’t happened in a while (rotten luck at LibraryThing early reviewers lately). I’ve been trying to spend less money on books, actually, and use my library and book trading sites more. It’s been working out pretty well– except now I’m spending all my money on postage (and collectibles) instead of books. Whoops.

What does your list look like? Where did you get your last 20 reviewed books from?

Thursday Tea: July 30

Posted by Anastasia on July 30, 2009 No Responses »

Jul 302009

Thursday Tea is a weekly meme hosted by yours truly. To play along, all you need is some tea, a book, and the will to answer some very simple questions: what tea are you drinking (and do you like it)? What book are you reading (and do you like it)? Tell us a little about your tea and your book, and whether or not the two go together.

The tea: I found these slightly expensive Tazo iced tea things on campus this week. I’ve only tried the Brambleberry flavor (they also have a regular black tea), which is really good. It kinda reminds me of the iced berry chai infusion at Starbucks, except the Brambleberry doesn’t give me headaches. Ahem.

According to my bottle, the tea has an infusion of hibiscus, cinnamon, peppermint, lemongrass, rosehips, orange peel, and natural lemon essence, plus apple and marion blackberry juices. It’s delicious and refreshing, plus it comes with a free karma boost (by recycling the bottle, apparently).

The book: I was a little worried about starting Sunnyside, Glen David Gold’s new book, because I loved Carter Beats the Devil so much and it’s hard to top anything that I love enough to carry around with me for days after finishing it, flipping randomly through the pages and rereading sentences. But! I’m about 30 pages into Sunnyside and I’m enjoying it. Maybe not as much as Carter Beats the Devil, but it’s early days yet.

Here’s a (rather puke-worthy) summary of the book:

Glen David Gold, author of the best seller Carter Beats the Devil, now gives us a grand entertainment with the brilliantly realized figure of Charlie Chaplin at its center: a novel at once cinematic and intimate, heartrending and darkly comic, that captures the moment when American capitalism, a world at war, and the emerging mecca of Hollywood intersect to spawn an enduring culture of celebrity.

Sunnyside opens on a winter day in 1916 during which Charlie Chaplin is spotted in more than eight hundred places simultaneously, an extraordinary delusion that forever binds the overlapping fortunes of three men: Leland Wheeler, son of the world’s last (and worst) Wild West star, as he finds unexpected love on the battlefields of France; Hugo Black, drafted to fight under the towering General Edmund Ironside in America’s doomed expedition against the Bolsheviks; and Chaplin himself, as he faces a tightening vise of complications—studio moguls, questions about his patriotism, his unchecked heart, and, most menacing of all, his mother.

The narrative is as rich and expansive as the ground it covers, and it is cast with a dazzling roster of both real and fictional characters: Mary Pickford, Douglas Fairbanks, Adolph Zukor, Chaplin’s (first) child bride, a thieving Girl Scout, the secretary of the treasury, a lovesick film theorist, three Russian princesses (gracious, nervous, and nihilist), a crew of fly-by-the-seat-of-their-pants moviemakers, legions of starstruck fans, and Rin Tin Tin.

By turns lighthearted and profound, Sunnyside is an altogether spellbinding novel about dreams, ambition, and the dawn of the modern age.

Do they go together? Sure! Parts of Sunnyside take place in California, and the Brambleberry bottle has so many hippy-ish phrases on it (“SHAKE THIS BOTTLE before opening to the mix the real herbal tea inside in a swirling, joyous dance.”) that it seems to be a good match. (When I think “California,” I thik hippies and yuppies. And redwoods.)

What are you drinking/reading this Thursday?

Review: The Demon and the City by Liz Williams (2008)

Posted by Anastasia on July 29, 2009 No Responses »

Jul 292009

The Demon and the City (Detective Inspector Chen #2) by Liz Williams
Publication: Night Shade Books (November 1, 2008), ebook
Genre: Urban Fantasy, Sci-Fi
Rating:
Find @ Webscriptions.net
First sentence: The Chinese inhabitants of Singapore Three say that August is an unlucky month.

Previously: Snake Agent (Detective Inspector Chen #1)

In one sentence: Somewhat blah mystery, but wonderful characters and more spotlight time for Zhu!

I really enjoyed the first Detective Inspector Chen book, so I was of course excited to read the next installment. It was a little different from the first book, not only because the focus was more on Zhu Irzh than on Chen, but also that the mystery wasn’t as, uh, interesting. But! I still had fun reading it, and it’s a

Summary from Amazon:

The sequel to Snake Agent (2005) returns to Singapore Three, a twenty-first-century cityscape renowned for its ready access to the denizens of heaven and hell. While Detective Inspector Wei Chen takes a brief hiatus from his customary paranormal investigations, his underworld sidekick, vice-squad-specialist Zhu Irzh, stumbles on a tricky case involving the apparently demonic murder of a beautiful young woman. When the trail leads to the heiress of the powerful Paugeng Corporation, Zhu Irzh feels inexplicably drawn to this devilishly ruthless but very human woman and inadvertently implicates himself as a murder suspect. Chen’s return to sort things out only complicates matters, however, as the pair tracks other suspects, including an enigmatic demon the corporation has been harboring for experimental purposes and a celestial goddess whose unlikely alliance with hell threatens to rain chaos down on the earthbound.

Zhu Irzh was one of my favorite characters from Snake Agent, along with Chen and poor Sergeant Ma (whod idn’t get nearly enough airtime), and so I wasn’t put off by being focused on him more than Chen (though the series is named after Chen, the title should have been a clue). It was nice to see how he was settling into his new role as Hell liaison, and to see how he worked compared to Chen. Have you ever seen Life on Mars? Zhu Irzh tends to be more like DCI Gene Hunt while Chen is more like DI Sam Tyler. (If you’ve never seen Life on Mars, you’ll have no idea what I’m talking about, as well as having missed out on an excellent television series.) In other words, Zhu Irzh is more shoot-first-ask-later; Chen is more explain-everything-before-I-shoot-you-unless-you-shoot-me-first.

Anyway, the actual mystery was, like I said, kinda boring. The story, too, seemed a little polished than Snake Agent, and so I focused my attention on the bits I liked. I was much more interested in the developing romance between Robin, who works for the Paugeng Corporation, and Mhara, a “subject” of the Paugeng Corporation, than anything else, even Zhu Irzh’s own romance. Probably because I wasn’t paying too much attention to that aspect of the story, I lost track of what was happening halfway through and had to reread the solution a few times to make sure I understood everything. At least, I hope it was because I wasn’t paying attention, and not because it was poorly orchestrated. It wasn’t an entirely satisfactory ending, if I can say that without having to warn for spoilers, but neither was it horrible. That actually makes it sound worse than it was– being vague and avoiding spoilers can be so annoying, sometimes.

It actually got very exciting near the end, with a lot of chase scenes and things blowing up, etc. And there was a happy ending with Robin and Mhara! Not the typical mush-filled one, thankfully, but something much more interesting and more true to the characters/book. Ms. Williams really does some nifty things in her books, and though the mystery aspect didn’t interest me her characters and her writing did– and still do.

All in all, I enjoyed reading The Demon and the City despite its problems, and I look forward to reading the third book. Huzzah!

Other reviews: I Am Completely Serious | The Reader Ecletic | Perrynomasia

Mini Reviews: Eastern Standard Tribe, The Demon's Lexicon, Fly By Night, Heroes of the Valley

Posted by Anastasia on July 28, 2009 No Responses »

Jul 282009

Eastern Standard Tribe by Cory Doctorow
Publication: ebook, 2004
Genre: Fiction
Rating:
Find free @ Craphound.com
First sentence: I once had a Tai Chi instructor who explained the difference between Chinese and Western medicine thus: “Western medicine is based on corpses, things that you discover by cutting up dead bodies and pulling them apart. Chinese medicine is based on living flesh, things observed from vital, moving humans.”

In one sentence: Decent enough, but kinda weird and maybe only makes sense to programmers.

I’ve liked other books by Cory Doctorow, so I reasonably sure I’d like this one. And I did, kind of, but some parts of it read like a blog post written for computer programmers and some other parts were just weird. For instance, the scene where the main character compares his girlfriend’s body parts to various foods while they’re having sex. I find that disgusting, actually, and yet it’s the kind of thing that’s popped up in a few books I’ve read by male authors. Wtf, male authors? Why must you continuously compare women to food? Are all the stereotypes about men and food true, or are you just trying to gross me out?

Anyway, I overall liked the book, but not as much as I’ve liked some of Mr. Doctorow’s other stuff. People who aren’t hardcore internet users might have a hard time understanding the book (heck, even I had a slightly difficult time figuring things out, and I’m online at least 8 hours a day!), and the way the timeline has been cut up and stuck back together is a little confusing. Nevertheless, I finished it, and some of the ideas in it were interesting and thought-provoking. I do think it’s work checking out if you think it’ll be something you’ll like– plus, it’s free! No reason not to check it out, really.

The Demon’s Lexicon by Sarah Rees Brennan
Publication: Margaret K. McElderry (June 2, 2009), Hardback, 336 pages / ISBN 1416963790
Genre: Fantasy, YA
Rating:
Find @ Amazon or IndieBound
Challenges: Support Your Local Library Challenge (#24)
First sentence: The pipe under the sink was leaking again.

In one sentence: Like Supernatural, except set in Britain and with younger characters.

I was previously familiar with Sarah Rees Brennan from her Livejournal blog, so I was a little worried about reading her new book. It’s always weird reading a book by someone who’s told you what color underwear she’s wearing (or whatever), and it didn’t help that the first part of The Demon’s Lexicon is simultaneously boring and misleading. It starts off with a joke-y attitude, but that’s cast off somewhere in the third chapter and then continues to plod along until about the last fourth of the book. Then it gets really exciting, ceases to be boring, and completely makes me want to read the next book. I feel a bit tricked, actually.

There are a few problems, such as Mae-the-Mary-Sue, but the twist was very well done, and by the time I got to the end I was having a lot of fun. I also couldn’t help thinking that it might have been more effective if it had been written first person POV instead of third– it very nearly reads that way anyway, just with “Nick” in place of “I.” Of course it’s reminiscent of Supernatural, nearly uncannily so, but if you like Supernatural, as I do, that’s not necessarily a bad thing. I’m not entirely sure if I’d still give it 4/5 birds if I reread it now, but the rush I got from the end of it was so large that I temporarily forgot how much the first part of the book bored me. Is that good? No idea. But I would recommend The Demon’s Lexicon for anyone who’s looking for an exciting summer book and/or something to tide them over until the next season of Supernatural starts.

Fly By Night by Frances Hardinge
Publication: HarperCollins (April 25, 2006), Hardcover, 496 pages / ISBN 0060876271
Genre: Fiction, YA/Chiildren’s
Rating:
Find @ Amazon or IndieBound
Challenges: Support Your Local Library Challenge (#23)
First sentence: “But names are important!” the nursemaid protested.

In one sentence: The world is creepy (no books but those approved by a committee!) but the characters (and story) are lovely.

I recently read Ms. Hardinge’s Well Witched and loved it. Fly By Night maybe wasn’t as magical/creepy as Well Witched, but it was just as good and just as enjoyable. Mosca, the protagonist, reminds me of Lyra from His Dark materials except less cold and unfathomable. Though I wouldn’t want her as a friend, I admired her tenacity and she was an excellent character for a book set in violent, oppressive world. The story itself is a little slow, but it builds up to a wowzer of an ending.

Heroes of the Valley by Jonathan Stroud
Publication: Hyperion Book CH (2009), Hardcover, 496 pages / ISBN 142310966X
Genre: Fantasy, Adventure, YA
Rating:
Find @ Amazon or IndieBound
Challenges: 2009 Pub Challenge (#7)
First sentence: Listen then, and I’ll tell you again of the Battle of the Rock.

In one sentence: Just as good as the Bartimaeus trilogy, and, in some ways, even better.

I keep thinking I’ve already written a review for this, I’ve talked about it so much in Real Life. Basically: excellent story, excellent character, excellent writing. I’m so happy it wasn’t another Bartimaeus #3, and I’m even happier that it has such a strong female almost-lead in it! The ties to Norse mythology were done well, and it was interesting to see things that seemed familiar (vikings, heroes, etc) but weren’t necessarily what we’re used to.

It’s not as funny as the Bartimaeus trilogy, but it has a much better ending and much less tragedy. The world seems a little better set up and detailed, but that’s probably because it’s confined to one valley. The writing seems a little more…flow-y, too, which was very nice. I think if you like Neil Gaiman you’ll like Heroes of the Valley, as it reminds me a lot of Stardust. Huzzah!

TSS: July 26 (Goals)

Posted by Anastasia on July 26, 2009 No Responses »

Jul 262009

You know that feeling you get after you’ve finished a big project, and don’t have anything lined up after it? I’ve been feeling that way since my class ended last week, and I’ve been kind of floating around trying to find something to do (besides read, I mean). It only just hit me somewhere around Wednesday that, DUH, I have a lot of reviews to write! So now my goal is to get at least half of my June reviews done before the next semester starts in late August.

I do realize that summer is meant to be a time for relaxing, but I’ve already gone on vacation and I just don’t think I’m the kind of person who can’t not have some goal in mind to accomplish, even if it’s something little like working on my blog. As long as I don’t get stressed out about it, it’s all good, right?

Does anyone else feel this way? Or have you all managed to convince yourselves to completely relax in the summertime?

Books read this week:
151. Sushi For Beginners – Marian Keyes [rating: 4/5]
152. Million Dollar Baby – Amy Patricia Meade [rating: 2.5/5]
153. The Deeds of the Disturber (Amelia Peabody #5) – Elizabeth Peters [rating: 4.5/5]
154. Whose Body? – Dorothy L. Sayers [rating: 3/5]

Books reviewed this week:
Eon: Dragoneye Reborn (Eon #1) – Alison Goodman [rating: 3.5/5]

And:
- I was this week’s Scene of the Blog at Kittling:Books! Yay!
- Where do you keep your books? Hunting around for bookshelf porn, yeah.

Where do you keep your books? (aka show and tell time)

Posted by Anastasia on July 24, 2009 No Responses »

Jul 242009

There have been some comments and posts this week that’ve inspired me to think more about my shelves, and where I keep my books. For the most part I’ve got them all squirreled away either in my cases or, er, in my closets (and my brother’s old room). Some of them, though, have been stacked up on the floor, and while normally it’s not a big deal lately I find myself constantly tripping over my library book stack. Whoops!

So, where do you keep your books? Are they all neatly tucked away on your shelves? Are you like me, with piles and stacks hidden away in closets and under bathroom sinks? Or do you keep your books somewhere else entirely? What do your shelves look like? Mine have got a bunch of stuff displayed in front of my books, but I know some people like to keep that space clear.

Here’s what my book storage situation looks like (for the most part):
Continue reading »

Review: Eon: Dragoneye Reborn by Alison Goodman (2008)

Posted by Anastasia on July 23, 2009 2 Responses »

Jul 232009

Eon Eon: Dragoneye Reborn (Eon #1) by Alison Goodman
Publication: Viking Juvenile (December 26, 2008), Hardback, 544 pages / ISBN 0670062278
Genre: YA/Teen, Fantasy
Rating:
Find @ Amazon or IndieBound
Challenges: Support Your Local Library Challenge (#22)
First sentence: I let the tips of both my swords dig into the sandy arena floor.

In one sentence: Interesting fantasy world, but disappointing and frustrating main character.

I really wanted to like this book. It’s got dragons, it’s got an alternate Asian world (a la Avatar: The Last Airbender), it’s got a female protagonist, it’s got…other stuff. But unfortunately, I was continuously frustrated with Eon(a), the main character, the people around her, and especially the ending.

Summary from Amazon:

Eon has been studying the ancient art of Dragon Magic for four years, hoping he’ll be able to apprentice to one of the twelve energy dragons of good fortune. But he also has a dark secret. He is actually Eona, a sixteen-year-old girl who has been living a dangerous lie for the chance to become a Dragon-eye, the human link to an energy dragon’s power. It is forbidden for females to practice the Dragon Magic and, if discovered, Eon faces a terrible death. After a dazzling sword ceremony, Eon’s affinity with the twelve dragons catapults him into the treacherous world of the Imperial court, where he makes a powerful enemy, Lord Ido. As tension builds and Eon’s desperate lie comes to light, readers won’t be able to stop turning the pages…

See, here’s the thing. Throughout the book Eon(a) is constantly bombarded with people telling her that women are bad, weak, useless creatures show can’t do anything but maybe make food and babies. It fits with the time period and the place– somewhat ancient China, I think– and it’s a pretty typical mindset besides. However. I do not agree with the decision to make Eon(a) actually agree with that mindset and continue to agree with it for the majority of the book. It wasn’t until, literally, the very end that she finally even admitted that she was a woman, and only then because she was going to die if she didn’t. And still she thinks she’s worthless, even though she just kicked a lot of butt! Eon(a) has no self-confidence, and it got really tiring reading about her panicking about, oh, everything every single page.

I feel that for a fantasy book like this to work, the main character has to be strong and be willing to change, and I don’t feel that Eon(a) was. It was very disheartening, and though I can understand what Ms. Goodman was trying to do– showing how a potentially awesome person gets beaten down through the world around her– I didn’t feel like there was a spark of rebellion anywhere in Eon(a)’s character, and I do think that’s an important thing to have in any character, let alone one who is constantly beaten down and degraded. It’s the willingness to be better than people say you can be that’s needed in a book like this.

I’m not sure if I’m entirely putting that the way I want it, but hopefully you get my drift. As for the ending– it was…meh. Bad guys got off too lightly, good guys were either missing, nearly dead, or blundering around stupidly, and the entire thing was left dangling over a very big, very steep cliff. Obviously it’s going to be continued in the second book, but the way the end of book one was left hanging, it seemed more like something was accidentally left off at the printers.

There were some interesting and enjoyable things in Eon (though they tended to be overshadowed by my frustration with Eon(a)). For instance, there’s a cute little romance between a eunuch and a transsexual courtier (the only character I DID like) that I wanted more of. The dragon-style fighting was interesting, as was the bits with Eon(a) and the prince that made me think it could blossom into a romance (yay). I liked the idea of the world itself, and the descriptions of it were lovely (if a little long).

But otherwise I spent most of my time reading Eon with a headache and a big load of disappointment, and I don’t think I’ll be reading the second book. I’m pretty sensitive to injustices, though, in that I have a really hard time reading about them when I know they can’t be corrected (I can’t even read Dickens!). If you have no such problems, and if you like YA fantasy with a bit of an edge, then you might like Eon: Dragoneye Reborn.

Other reviews:
Positive: TangognaT | The Cool Cafe @ Englewood Public Library | Eilis O’Neal

Negative: Karissa’s Reading Review | The YA YA YAs